


Left and Leaving

by audreyslove



Series: Signed Sealed Delivered [6]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-15
Updated: 2018-07-15
Packaged: 2019-06-10 16:09:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15295209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/audreyslove/pseuds/audreyslove
Summary: Written for #OQHappyEnding, Day 6Signed, Sealed, Delivered verse: first fight/makeup





	Left and Leaving

There’s a bit of a honeymoon period after Robin moves back in, and Regina starts to wonder if it will ever end. They have tough therapy sessions, but nothing ever seems to land into a serious argument.

But now they are fighting, a real fight, and Regina isn’t sure how it’s going to be resolved.

“I’m just saying we should be saving for Roland’s future. We should at least have some money in case we ever want to move or expand our family. And I know you owe Ava a lot, but she lives well, she—”

“She’s my _mother_ ,” Robin counters. “I owe her _everything._ ”

“She’s living in a nicer house than we do, and somehow we have to give her $300 a month? Still? Really Robin, she didn’t pay for your school, she barely raised you, what exactly do you owe her?”

“She gave me _my life!”_ Robin argues violently. “And she tried her best, Regina, she did, it wasn’t perfect, but—”

“Trust me I know it wasn’t perfect. I’ve been a guest in your mother’s home since I was eighteen. And she never treated you well! She completely ignored what you went through with your father when it was convenient to do so! She manipulates you, and you let her, you are so obsessed with being the good son that you—”

“Stop talking about my mother when you have _no_ idea what you are talking about!” Robin shoots back. “You weren’t there, you’re a spoiled little brat who never had to deal with what we did, so you can shut the fuck up about my family right now!”

“Fuck you!” she all but screams back, but Roland is in the house, she has to be quiet. It’s her family too, after all. And how can he say she doesn’t know them? And throw her own terrible childhood in her face as if it were perfect? “Fuck you, fuck you so much, how _dare_ you act like my childhood was all roses when you know I’ve had my own battles to deal with, and—“

“Yes, your mother is an abusive bitch and yet we still have to see her everytime she wishes,” he snarls back. “Oh I hate her Regina, and she hates me so much, I don’t even think she likes Roland, for fucks sake, but I put up with it, the least you can do is do the same for me, my mother loves you _and_ Roland, and we are down to only one loving grandparent so I think we should take what we can get and be grateful!”

It stings, reminding her that her own wonderful father is dead, that her mother (she loves her mother, hates that she loves her, but loves her all the same) is indifferent toward them. It hurts feeling like she should be _grateful_ to have anyone care about her and her child. She’s so hurt, so angry...

“Who knows, maybe if we toss my mother a few hundred a month she will start pretending to like us too, just like Ava. Is that why you give her money? So she will love you? Money has always been a requirement for her affection, hasn’t it?” Regina spits back.

His eyes go wide, and he bites his lip. His face is heat red.

She’s gone too far, she knows that now. She has to apologize, she has to…

He’s storming out before she can say a word.

The door slams behind her and she shudders at the sound.

Terror strikes her, and she thinks of the last time he left, that dark Thanksgiving.

Fuck, not again, please not again, she doesn’t think she can go through another separation, not when she loves him and appreciates him to a level she felt not possible before, that year apart has strengthened all her feelings for him, and her heart is very much on her sleeve.

She waits a few minutes, but she hears the faint sound of his car starting up, and that’s when she knows he’s really leaving.

Tears come before she can will them away.

It doesn’t even matter. There’s no one to hide them from anymore.

He’s gone.

.::.

It’s chilly out, which is good, because Robin is fuming. He takes the keys when he leaves, but after a few blocks he just parks and gets out to walk. The cool air feels good against his cheeks.

He doesn’t know how it got to this.

His mother loves him, and Regina, and fuck his mum has a lot of faults, but she’s been abused by many men in her life and Robin is determined to show her she raised a son who is _nothing_ like the men she’s dealt with. And who is Regina to judge Ava, with a mother like Cora?

Cora has more in common with the abusive men who used his mother, really.

And the implication that his mum is _using_ them? It’s fucked up is what it is.

Regina has been with him through his tumultuous relationship with her mum, she’s held him while he’s _cried_ over the pain she’s caused, she knows how much she means to him, she knows how hard it is on him when they don’t get along, doesn’t she?

Why can’t she just let him have this, just let him feel good over the relationship they now have? And what difference is it if a few hundred dollars a month makes his mom feel more comfortable? She’s dealing with a hard breakup, anyway, and living off of what she got from Leo only goes so far…

He just wants to make her feel better and Regina seemed to make him into a villain for that and it is _so_ fucking unfair of her. He felt himself fuming, saw himself saying something he would regret, the way he does when he feels threatened or attacked. That could have quickly become an argument where they really hurt one another, and he is _not_ going to do that again.

Thank god he got out of there when he did. Because he has to cool off to argue with her properly. He has to do what his therapist said, take deep breaths, listen to things, see where the argument went wrong and try to fix it.

He passes a bar and realizes he’s walked himself down to the U Street area. Fuck it, why not have a drink?

It’s slow for a Tuesday. He is lucky to get a spot in the corner, huddled up with a beer and his feelings.

Part of dealing with anger issues is acknowledging what mistakes you have made, what made things escalate. You can’t control others, but you can control yourself. So as much as he’d like to say this is all Regina’s fault, he knows blaming it all on her won’t get them anywhere, and experience has taught him he will regret many of his actions in a day or weeks time, so why not acknowledge them now?

Hopefully he will be ready to come home before Regina is in bed. He might have to wake her up because god knows he’s never letting them go to bed angry at one another.

He wonders if he woke up Roland by slamming that door. Damn it, he should not have done that.

One thing to apologize for.

And he had been angry at Regina since the moment she suggested they stop paying Ava. She hadn’t suggested it to be mean. They were going over the budget, and it was an easy expense to cut, wasn’t it?

He had gotten immediately defensive and started this whole mess.

Two things to apologize for.

He replays the fight and thinks about the words he used.

_Spoiled little brat._

That, he has to apologize for. And tell her he doesn’t see her that way. She _did_ have it rough growing up, and despite a rather opulent childhood, Regina has been more than willing to live on a middle class salary. She’s never made him feel bad for not having more, she’s bought clothes off of sales racks and been insanely happy with the small, short vacations they can afford.

She’s been called spoiled her whole life and he threw it in her face.

Then he threw in her face how awful Cora is compared to Ava — something she already knows. She doesn’t like the fact that she doesn’t have a family of her own the way Robin does; it’s an insecurity for her, he knows that.

He shouldn’t have pushed her like that.

A fourth thing to apologize for.

He finishes his second beer and feels like absolute shit.

He just wants to get home.

When he pulls in the driveway, he sees the light is on in the living room and breathes a sigh of relief.

Regina is still up.

He nearly runs to the door, but when he opens it, he’s entirely unprepared for what she sees.

Because his wife is sobbing at the kitchen table. There’s something in her hand, but when she sees him, she holds it tightly in one hand as she smoothes her other over her hair.

There’s no sense in pretending she wasn’t crying, as much as Regina would like to, he knows. He’s seen the tears, clear as day. She seems to know that, though she struggles to compose herself, her back going rigid as she wipes her eyes half heartedly, and then asks, “Are you, are you here to get your stuff?”

“What?” His blood rushes cold, “Regina, please, don’t, please don’t kick me out, I—“

She manages to laugh - a loud, wet little thing. “I didn’t kick you out, Robin. You _left._ You _left_ me, just like last time—“

He can’t believe what he’s hearing and rushes to correct her. “No, no no no, Regina I would never _ever_ leave you; I just stepped out. I didn’t leave _.”_

 _Shit._ Guilt eats at him hungrily until he feels there’s nothing left of himself except stress and regret. He never once considered that Regina would ever think he was leaving for good, that he’d ever — _ever_ — walk out on his family.

He sits beside her and reaches for her. He doesn’t think he can bare it if she refused a hug right now so he won’t try for it. But his hand falls over hers, and then she drops the object in her hand. His locket. She had replaced the young photo of Roland with a picture of him. Her two favorite Locksleys, she said. It means something to her, and it kills him that she’s been clinging to it tonight while thinking it was all going away.

He keeps his hand on her trembling one until she twists it so she can lace her fingers through his, and then everything feels a bit more settled.

They will get through this.

It’s that thought that has him trying his luck, pulling her toward him.

She goes willingly, lets him wrap himself around her, hugging her tightly. She’s still crying. He thinks he might be a second away from crying himself.

She pulls out of the hug all angry, slapping his forearm and huffing, tearstained face and red eyes all on display. “You can’t _do_ that, you can’t just leave, I didn’t know what you were doing, or where you were going, I didn’t know anything, I thought you were leaving me all over again, I—“

His heart aches at her words, but he can’t bear to hear them anymore, so he places a hand on each cheek and leans in, looking her right in the eyes.

“Look at me,” he says with passion, not sternly but… with force. So she knows he’s being serious.

“I would sooner claw out my own eyes than walk out on you, do you understand?”

She sniffles and swallows heavily but says nothing, and that silence is terrifying to him.

“I’d rather rip out my own heart than go through that again,” he insists. She softens a bit, breathing in heavy as she struggles to contain herself.

“These are very violent ideas you have,” she says in a half choked whisper.

It seems his graphic descriptions are lightening the mood, so he goes for it. “I’d rather feed my limbs to wild animals and watch them eat them,” he says, a sliver of a smile falling on his face. When she laughs, his smiles back at her, wiping at some of the stray wetness still on her cheeks, reaching for her hands so he can press a kiss to each knuckle. Each kiss a promise he’s making to fix things, to keep them together. “If I even thought for a moment that you believed I was capable of leaving for good I never would have walked out. I just wanted to cool down. I didn’t want us to say things we would regret.”

“Last time you left…” she trails off, breathing carefully until it evens out, until she sounds together. His heart aches for her, for them both, thinking of that painful night where he walked out on his family and didn’t return for a full year. “I know I told you to leave, but I just kept thinking you’d come right back, even after you packed up your things, I kept waiting for you to come home. I kept waiting, longer than I should have, and you _never_ did. And it broke me.”

“It won’t happen again,” Robin promises. “Back then I thought I was calling your bluff. It almost ruined us. I would never walk out on you, not unless you forced me out.”

She nods, breathing a sigh of relief as she falls into his arms.

“Next time you do that, you leave—“

Fuck, how could she ever think there will be a _next time_?

“I’m never doing this again,” Robin repeats as soothingly as possible. He could never turn his back on her again, could never purposely hurt her like this, not again. His eyes are bleary and wet as he croaks out “Seeing you cry and knowing I’m the cause is on my list of things I never want to see again.”

“If we need to leave or… take a breather,” Regina amends, “Maybe…” her voice goes meek and her expression shy. “It may help if we…” She doesn’t want to finish, and it’s clear it’s something she feels unsure about.

“What is it, love?” Robin asks. He tries to keep his voice soft as his hand reaches to play with her hair, brushing back a few stray strands that threaten to fall into her eyes, and then repeating the action. Her hair is so thick, so soft. He really doesn’t appreciate it enough, he thinks, as he indulges in another touch.

“Maybe if we, before we left...” Her eyes fall downward, like she can’t even meet his face. “If we just said that we loved one another, it might...” she trails off, but his breath is catching in his throat; he can’t speak to reassure her. “You know what? Nevermind. It’s not realistic. When we are so angry it’s hard to reassure one another, to say ‘i love you’s’, forget it, I—“

“I think it’s perfect.” Robin smiles before claiming her lips. He knows these things are hard to voice, for both of them, the“I remember — distinctly — what it felt like when I thought you didn’t love me, and it was awful. I’d like to hear it and say it as much as possible. Even when I’m mad at you, I’ll have no problem saying it.”

She mods and leans into him, another tight embrace. This time he urges her up with him, until he’s standing and holding her, her legs wrapping tight around him as he moves them to the couch.

When she leans her head into his neck and presses a kiss there, he’s hit with a punch of lust.

He wants to take her to bed, he’s desperate to reconnect and _feel_ how good they are together, but he’s not supposed to be solving all their problems with sex. They have to talk it out first, resolve everything and _then_ he will haul her up to their bed and be with her in every way she lets him.

So he walks them to the couch and plops down. She stays on his lap, leans in to kiss his lips and then pulls herself in for another hug.

“I’m sorry for what I said,” she murmurs, and god he doesn’t care, he loves her, only her, all that matters is them and their son. “I know Ava loves us, it was unfair of me to say she’s manipulating you, I know she—“

“I said unfair things too,” Robin reminds. “Especially about Cora and I called you spoiled, and I am so, so sorry. I love you, and you’ve never acted that way with me.”

Regina nods, combing fingers through his hair, lightly scratching at his scalp in a way that is tender and sexy at the same time.

“I love you. I’m sorry.”

But he should be the sorry one. “You were right, though. We don’t need to give her money. She just worries everytime she has a breakup, she’s so dependent on her boyfriends. Money is stability for her, so I want to give it to her.”

“Then we keep giving it to her,” Regina shrugs. “I can cut back on clothes, we don’t have to order takeout as much, I’m sure there’s a way to save money.”

“Let’s… it’s not the _amount_ that helps, it’s just the fact there’s money at all that makes her feel safe. Let’s just cut it to $150 a month, for now?” Robin asks hopefully. “And then maybe whittle it down to nothing as she understands she’s capable of living on her own budget.”

Regina nods and whispers, “Thank you,” then she frowns and says, “There’s one more thing that bothered me.” It’s almost like a whisper, and he searches his memory for what he did - the slamming door, should he apologize for that? “You said that I don’t know anything about _your_ family. And I know Ava is your mother, I do, but Robin your family is _my_ family, too. You and Emma and Mary Margaret, Ava too. You’re more mine than my own has ever been, and I might not have been there through everything you have, but…” she trails off and flashes a sheepish smile.

“Neither has Mary Margaret,” Robin gives, tucking that stubborn strand of hair behind her ear. “She is still family, too. I’m sorry, of course they are your family, too. I didn’t mean it that way. I never would.”

Because they’ve talked about her insecurity over that in therapy, and he’s fully aware of how much she loves them and is terrified to lose them. But he’s happy to share, in fact he’s thrilled he has someone who loves his family so much and considers herself a part of it. It is _her_ family as much as his, he truly means that, no matter what complications come in their future, their family will be there for both of them.

“Thank you,” she sighs into his neck and kisses him there. “I’m still scared sometimes that this is all going to go away.”

“Me too,” he admits. “But it won’t.”

He kisses her, slowly at first, just trading light pecks, but then she deepens a kiss, moaning softly into his mouth as her hands wrap around him.

He never can resist her when she’s like this — on his lap, all around him like this.

His nerves are still standing on end from the emotional conversation, and he wants her, wants to make her feel good, pump her full of endorphins after causing her all that pain.

And they managed to talk through this fight without using sex, but that doesn’t mean they can’t have it tonight.

He wants to watch her come, wants to see her gasping in pleasure and know he is the cause.

Just the thought of watching her like that has him hardening underneath her, as she kisses and kisses. she feels it, she must, she starts rocking on his hips, letting out a grateful sigh as she grinds particularly hard ava inst him.

“Is this against the rules?” Regina asks as she breaks out of the kiss, a bit breathless.

“We talked it out, we apologized to one another, we got through it already,” Robin mutters between kisses to her neck, down her chest. “And I was going to be all over you tonight before we fought, anyway. You were wearing a light colored tank top with no bra. If we don’t, it will be because the fighting _stopped_ us from having sex, and we can’t have that.” He hears her floaty little laugh as he fondles her breast through the soft cotton.

“Well…” Regina kisses him, rocks herself into his erection with a devilish swish of her hips, “When you put it that way, I guess we better fuck.” She swallows his groans in a deep kiss. “We can’t let that little fight get to us, can we?”

“Never.” He agrees, and then he’s stripping her of her tank top, cupping and stroking and kissing her breasts, causing her to sigh with pleasure as she grinds against him.

He makes her come on that couch, once, on his tongue, again, with his cock, and later, early in that morning on his cock.

It feels an awful lot like makeup sex, the way it feels, reassuring, comforting, loving, finding one another again after a small loss.

But it’s not a substitute for talking it through, from locating a problem with communication and resolving the matter, discovering how to fix this issue from occuring in the future.

They figured it all out, fought, and then calmed down and talked it out without harsh words or threats, without the need for orgasms to quiet their anger and hurt feelings. They are getting better. Therapy is working.

And it doesn’t take away their passion. Only makes them stronger.


End file.
